Cinemanolis wrote:Lorna's Silence 6/10A good film but nothing close to the wonderful L'Enfant from the same directors. The last 20 minutes were boring and without purpose.

Ouch. I thought most of L'Enfant was boring and without purpose.

You certainly won't be a fan of 'Lorna's Silence' then. Even with the Dardenne brothers present at the screening, you could feel the audience getting impatient. Don't get me wrong it has some great moments, especially the way they suddenly introduce some plot turning points, but overall nothing you haven't seen before.

And a 'backstage' funny storyAt the screening, the President of the House of the Greek Parliament and the Festival Manager, were sitting right behind me. Before the main film, a short film by the Dardenne brothers was shown. It was called 'Darkness' and it was a 3 minute film without any dialog. After it ended he asked her a bit annoyed "Now you must tell me what the hell was that about, cause i didn't get it". Also he kept asking how long the film was and during the screening asking questions about the plot of the film.The highlight came during a scene of the film involving imigrants and trafikking. The man who was sitting next to him (probably his secretary, driver or bodyguard) whispered to him 'Oh come on these things don't happen, at least in our country'. The result was people around them starting to laugh, while the President himself didn't comment. If these people aren't interested in cinema, why the hell do they bother to show up, just for the photo opportunity. Really sad.

Just back from a weekend at the Thessaloniki International Film Festival

Lorna's Silence 6/10A good film but nothing close to the wonderful L'Enfant from the same directors. The last 20 minutes were boring and without purpose.

The Wrestler 7/10An unexpected strong performance from Rourke is the spine of the film. No actor would be more conviencing than him, but i am afraid that he wouldn't be conviencing in any other kind of role either. Marisa Tomei was good, but Evan Rachel Wood is even better with less screen time.

Rachel Getting Married 6/10The performances are all the money here. Hathaway is excellent, but all the supporting actors are equally impressive. The Broadway veteran Bill Irwin and Rosemary DeWitt could win Oscar nods, while Debra Winger is also wonderful but i can't see her shortlisted for such a small role.

This year i am especially excited since one of the 3 favourites to win the Best Picture award in the Greek competition (and thus be Greece's entry for next years' Oscars) is a film written by a friend of mine, directed by another friend and starring (in a supporting role) another friend. Fingers crossed...

Adaptation of Shakespeare's "Scottish Play" into Mumbai's Muslim "mafia" has very good performances and plenty of gravitas (even taking into account the musical numbers) but little visual panache. It's a pretty straight adaptation that doesn't really shed new light on the Bard's themes and structures.

Om Shanti Om (Farah Khan, 2007)

8/10

Bollywood at its most lavish and narratively overstuffed, but also in knowingly self-parodistic mode. For a while it seems like the Indian equivalent to what the folks behind Singin' in the Rain were doing for the previous generation of films in 1952, but soon enough it spins off in a dozen or more unlikely directions. If it's as witty as Green & Comden's script, then that doesn't exactly translate across language and cultural barriers. But there's a real ingenuity to the satire derived from the structure of the film. And the film's few annoyances (product placements, bad puns, icky gender roles, and the occasional potty humor) are quickly forgotten into this fast-paced assault of movie references (which I'm sure I didn't catch a quarter of), plot twists, eye-popping dance numbers, and intentionally over-the-top performances.